Rumsfeld: Obama's Foreign Policy a 'Step Back'

Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld says President Barack Obama has made a mess out of the nation’s foreign policy and his administration does not "lead from the front."

“I think that the foreign policy of this administration for four years now has been one of a step back — the phrase that came out of the White House, to lead from behind, which you can't lead from behind. Leaders lead from the front,” Rumsfeld told Greta Van Susteren of Fox News Monday night.

The government’s handling of the economy proves to the world that we’re in decline, he said. “It's clear the country is managing its economic affairs in a way that tells the world we're modeling America after Europe. And that's a failed model.”

The $600 billion of defense spending cuts slated for the next 10 years under the automatic spending reductions also are a problem, Rumsfeld said.

The cuts “send the signal out to the world that the United States will not be in a position to contribute to peace and stability and contribute to a better world, which we've done throughout my adult life,” he said. “We’re in withdrawal under this administration.”

Rumsfeld also is troubled by Obama’s policy of apology.

“The pattern of not even getting a status of forces agreement in Iraq, where we would have had an arrangement with that country, the setting of a timetable in Afghanistan, it seems to me, are examples of a withdrawal, a decline, a pullback by our country,” he said. “And I think that's unfortunate because I think that vacuum's being filled by people who don't have our interests at heart.”